Understandably, it was the Atlanta Braves' offense that was the headliner of the team's 17-2 rout of the Diamondbacks on Thursday. As it turns out, when you score 17 runs and literally every member of the starting lineup drives in a run, that gets a certain amount of justified attention. However, the Braves did have pitchers throw in this game, too, and Atlanta's starter happened to be Reynaldo Lopez.
At first glance, Lopez appears to have had a good night. He went five innings, which is fine, especially this early in the season when teams manage pitcher workloads aggressively. In giving up just one earned run on a solo homer and just four hits total against a sneaky good DBacks lineup, it looks like Lopez had a good night, and he did.
However, there are some signs from Lopez's first two starts that may be cause for concern, as it seems like Lopez's peripherals are starting the season down a tick or more.
The underlying metrics should have Braves fans concerned that Reynaldo Lopez is not 100%...yet
Now, this is not the same situation as we saw in camp. When Lopez came out throwing 5 mph lower than he had before his shoulder surgery during his last start of spring training, the level of concern was very high. However, Lopez attributed the velocity decrease to mechanical issues, and that seemed plausible after he (mostly) looked like his former self in his first regular-season start.
However, a closer look seems to show that Lopez has still been a different, and perhaps a lesser pitcher since returning to the mound. In 2024, Lopez's first season with Atlanta and his first season since being converted back to the rotation, he averaged 95.5 mph on his fastball, was in the top 20% in strikeout percentage with strong chase and whiff metrics. His average exit velocity against him wasn't great, but he made it work because he missed bats.
In 2026, the story has been different thus far, and again, all the small sample size warnings apply here. So far, Lopez has only managed to average 94.1 mph on his fastball, his strikeout rate has cratered (he had just three in five innings of work on Thursday), and while his chase rate has remained decent, his whiff rate has gone to being in the bottom 20% in baseball.
Now, this doesn't mean that Lopez is washed. While some red flags are emerging, this is still just 11 innings at the beginning of the season we are talking about. Ideally, as the weather warms up and Lopez builds his strength and stamina up to par, he will look better and better as he gets further away from his shoulder injury. However, fans may want to keep an eye on him because, at the moment, it is clear he isn't all the way back yet.